


you're just a chance i take

by rheniumvolution



Category: Marvel 616, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: M/M, also a lot of rooftop soul searching, and making out, weird mix of 616 and mcu
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-04
Updated: 2015-10-04
Packaged: 2018-04-24 19:22:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4932226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rheniumvolution/pseuds/rheniumvolution
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve gives him another weird look, but it’s softer, somehow. His shoulders aren’t nearly as tense. Clint hates himself a little for noticing that. Clint’s been gone on the guy since he was fifteen. But that was back when Captain America was an action figure, a comic book character. Now, Clint spends most of his time around him. </p>
<p>Now, Clint knows what Steve looks like when he’s tired, when he’s training, when he’s curled around a pillow on movie night with his knees tucked under himself, knows how Steve does a headcount every time he walks into a room, how everything in him seems to tense minutely when he can’t see everyone to keep them safe. </p>
<p>Now, it’s actually dangerous territory. Clint’s never been that good at getting himself out of dangerous territory. Normally, it has to almost kill him first.</p>
            </blockquote>





	you're just a chance i take

**Author's Note:**

> i got entirely too invested in this fic when it's like me, two other people, and a stale bagel. there's some hardcore self-worth issues but we're talking about clint barton here, so you probably should just expect that. have fun reading my gay garbage. 
> 
> title from kiesza's hideaway

The roof of his apartment building, it would prove, is not the greatest place for stargazing that has ever existed. That isn’t to say it’s a bad roof. It’s a great roof, one of the best roofs he’s ever had, keeps out the rain and everything. It’s more that the other buildings around Clint’s building tend to be taller. Shinier. Star-blocking tall and shiny. Then there’s the clouds and smog and what-have-you, but Clint is choosing to blame the other buildings.

Even with the somewhat disappointing lack of stars, the roof, as has been mentioned, is fucking fantastic. Most nights, there’s a good crowd up here, talking and playing beer pong or regular pong or throwing things off the side of the building and seeing what it hits. (He should probably put a stop to that, but last week, Nat came over and made it into the dumpster across the street, so he’s probably not going to put a stop to that.)

But now it’s too early for anyone to be going to work and too late for anyone to be coming home, and it’s quiet on the roof. Or, rather, there could be a lot of noise happening, people everywhere, but Clint also doesn’t have his hearing aids in.

So it’s quiet.

His ribs are bruised, but they aren’t broken, and he’s got nothing worse than that. Some cuts and bumps. At worst, his ankle has been sprained. It’s a good night.

Someone taps his shoulder.

“Jesus,” he says on instinct jumping to his feet. The quick movement makes him wince, breath leaving him in a harsh exhale. _Ow_.

Captain America’s standing on his roof. This is new.

“Sorry,” Steve says. “I didn’t mean to—” okay, that was _scare_? Or _pare_? Quite possibly, Captain America is apologizing for daring him, but it was probably scare.

He shakes his head. “‘S fine. Don’t have my hearing aids in, by the way.”

Steve’s eyes widen a little. “Oh.” He signs, _if you want, I can go._

Something in him warms at that, the fact that Steve Rogers is signing at him, learning even though he doesn’t have to. He swallows a smile and shakes his head again, a little firmer. “Nah. Should head inside anyway. Sometimes I come up here to... clear my head. Sulk. Throw impromptu pity parties. That’s always fun, sometimes there’s even prizes, but they usually aren’t--” Steve is looking at him funny, so he snaps his jaw closed. “Right. Anyway. You wanna come in?”

“Sure.”

Clint nods, heads towards the door. It’s still blocked the way he left it, which means Steve did some serious parkour to reach him, which is sort of flattering, and he shoves the metal chair out from under the handle and heads down the stairs. He looks back once to confirm that Steve’s following him. He is. He even smiles at Clint, a little bit.

He barely registers that he hasn’t had a chance to clean up his apartment before he’s letting Captain America in there, which means he gets the full impact of Clint’s lifestyle choices. These include, but are not limited to: an empty coffee pot on the breakfast bar, a pair of purple boxers on the floor in front of the couch, Lucky—currently jumping up to paw at Clint’s chest, and an arrow stuck in the wall near the front door. He pushes Lucky away with a tight laugh, stumbling slightly on his hurt ankle, and Lucky, the traitor that he is, turns his affections toward Steve instead. Clint takes that moment to hastily kick those boxers under the couch, but he leaves the arrow. There are arrows everywhere.

Steve is petting Lucky gently, and Clint feels something like envy in his chest before he shoos it away, vaguely frustrated with himself. Because what the fuck, brain? He’s jealous. That Captain America is, what? Petting his dog? _Honestly_. Lucky seems pretty content, though, so Clint climbs the stairs to the loft in a search for his hearing aids. (He’s also definitely favoring the ankle he injured earlier, but that’s something to worry about later.) They’re on the nightstand, and he didn’t leave them there, but Kate probably did when she was here earlier. Kate is perfect.

He slips them in as he’s coming back down the stairs and they make an annoying crackling noise when he turns them on. Clint winces, which doesn’t go unnoticed.

“Everything okay?” Steve asks.

“Peachy, Cap.” Clint says, “Just thinking I may be in for new ones. These ones only last a few years or so, anyway. I get the cheap ones. Not even new batteries could save em.”

Steve’s mouth turns down at the edges. “Why don’t you just have Stark make you some? I’m sure he’d be happy to help.”

Clint laughs, “You sound just like him.” And it’s true. He and Tony have had this argument, or one like it, time and time again. “I would, but he’d go all out, y’know? Expensive, fancy, probably make them do about a billion other things, too. I just-- I buy these. They’re not fancy, but they’re mine.” He shrugs, eyes ducking down. “You gotta work with what’s yours.”

When he glances up again, Steve is giving him that same look from the roof. Clint doesn’t focus on it.

“Anyway, I just got back from that last mission, like, a couple hours ago, so I hope you don’t mind if I’m patching myself up while you’re saying whatever you came here to say?”

Steve’s weird look shifts into his normal ‘I’m leading a group of supernaturally powered children’ face, and some of the weird tension falls away from Clint’s shoulders. “Shouldn’t you be at SHIELD, then? Debriefing? Medical?”

“I have no idea what any of those words mean,” Clint says.

Steve sighs. “Clint.”

“Look, I’m fine. Not even that banged up.” He moves towards the kitchen, rummaging around for one of the many first-aid kits stashed around here. “Anyway, what’d you need?”

“Nothing,” says Steve, and Clint pauses in his search, a little startled. He shakes it off, makes a _hm?_ sound.

“Heard you were back,” Steve says, sitting on the couch. Lucky lays his head on Steve’s lap. “I wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“Aha!” Clint says, tugging the first-aid kit out from under the sink. “I’m good, Cap, really. Here I was thinking you were after me for something else to do tonight.”

“If aliens start invading, you’ll be the first person I call.” There’s warmth in Steve’s voice, and Clint feels himself relax a little bit further. It always takes a day or two to come back to himself after a mission, even something as small as that had been.

Clint hauls the kit to the living room, dropping it with a thud on the table before sitting on the floor. Steve looks vaguely uncomfortable, like he wants to get up, offer Clint the couch, so Clint waves him back down. “If you call me about anything that isn’t ‘Hey, Hawkeye, the aliens are actually harmless and they want to make you the king of their planet and pamper you for the rest of your days,’ I will have to shoot you.”

Steve laughs, low and rumbly, “Noted.”

Clint focuses on bandaging the cut on his forearm so he doesn’t do something stupid, like blush.

He wraps up most of the cuts, sticks bandages on the smaller ones, and moves on to his ankle. When he tries to reposition it, pain shoots up his leg, radiating out through his back, and he winces. Steve makes a startled noise, and is on the ground in front of Clint before he can say, “It’s fine.”

“It’s not fine,” Steve says. “What’s wrong?”

“Sprained,” Clint says, poking his ankle lightly. “Definitely sprained. I’ll be fine.”

“You should be in medical,” Steve says.

“I hate medical,” Clint grumbles. He stares at his ankle. “Medical asks questions, and they aren’t as easy to distract as you are.”

“I am not easy to—” Steve shakes his head. “Stop that. You need to go to medical.”

Clint laughs a little, a short noise that tapers off into something like a whine when he moves his leg too much. Steve makes a soothing noise, placing his hand just below Clint’s knee while his other arm rummages through the first-aid kit on the table. His palm is warm and sure, thumb rubbing lightly at a spot behind Clint’s knee and that’s—okay. That should probably stop soon.

It doesn’t matter much, because Clint gets distracted by pain as soon as Steve’s hand touches his ankle.

“ _Shit_ ,” says Clint.

“Definitely sprained,” says Steve. "Badly, Clint, you should not have been walking on this."

“Should be a brace or something in there.”

“There is,” Steve says, holding it up so Clint can see it. “I’m gonna put this on, then we’re going to medical.”

Clint groans, “I’ve had worse and done less,” and Steve doesn’t look happy about that at all. It’s like the weird look from earlier, but ten times worse. “Stop that,” he says.

“Stop what?” Steve asks.

“Stop,” he says, grimacing through the pain of Steve adjusting the makeshift brace over his ankle, “ _looking_ at me. Like that. Like I’m—”

Steve pauses, looks at him. _Like you’re… what?_ he signs.

“I don’t know!” Clint says, “I have no idea what that look means. It’s very frustrating. I can handle the pity looks, or the irritated looks, or the occasional Tony Stark patented ‘Clint Barton is a sad mess who needs help’ look, but—you. I don’t know what you and your face want from me.”

Steve takes this moment, of course, to tighten the splint. Clint swears, loudly. “Come on,” says Steve, “we’re going to see a doctor.”

“I hate you,” Clint says, “so much.”

\--

“Hawkeye, if you could stop reading Cosmo, or doing whatever it is that you’re doing, I would really appreciate you shooting the robot off of me, thanks.” Tony kicks his foot out mid-air, but the robot hangs on with the determination of a toddler.

“I didn’t hear a please,” Clint says, even as he’s lining up the shot.

“Hawkeye,” Tony repeats, and Clint fires.

The robot drops several stories to the ground with a satisfying explosion.

“Widow, what’s your position?” Cap asks.

The comm is quiet for a second, then Natasha says, “Heading up Fourth. There’s a man with a helmet, cape, and something that looks like a remote.”

Steve says, “What’s the plan?”  
  


Natasha says, “I was gonna tackle him.”

Clint says, “I mean, I could--”

“Don’t finish that sentence.”

“Captain, yes, Captain.” He follows the flight of Iron Man instead, who is trying his damnedest to catch up to Natasha. Steve is a block over from the guy in the cape, fighting off six or so of the robots. Clint aims, draws, takes out two.

“Thanks,” says Steve.

“Don’t mention it.”

“Hawkeye,” says Tony.

“Oh my God, ask Thor, or Hulk, or _somebody else_ , Tony--”

“ _Iron Man_ ,” Steve corrects.

“ _Whatever_.”

Somewhere in the distance, a building explodes, Natasha says “So I may have tackled him,” and Steve Rogers lets out the most disappointed sigh Clint has ever heard.

Eventually they apprehend the monster behind the robots, who just kind of happens to be a bored engineering student at MIT. Clint’s fine, but Natasha has an impressive scrape across her cheekbone, and Tony’s limping. Banner is walking it off, and Thor is probably out trying to find a victory drink. Steve just looks tired.

“Hey,” says Clint, shouldering his bow.

“Hey,” says Steve.

“You wanna come with me?” Clint asks, before he can think it through. “There’s a roof thing.”

Steve looks at him. “What?”

“Like, there’s a thing. A party kind of thing. A gathering. It’s happening, right now, on my roof. The tenants do it. Much more fun than debriefing.” He can’t help but feel a little hopeful.

“Clint,” says Steve.

“No, no, seriously. It’s Saturday night. Pretend we have a normal job for once in your life and save the paperwork for Monday. Please.” A pause. “For me?”

Steve gives him another weird look, but it’s different than the other one. Softer, somehow. His shoulders aren’t nearly as tense. Clint hates himself a little for noticing that. Not for any internalized thing, no, he had his Big Bi Panic a long ass time ago.

This is more because… it’s Steve Rogers. Clint’s been gone on the guy since he was fifteen. But that was back when Captain America was an action figure, a comic book character. Now, Clint spends most of his time around him.

Now, Clint knows what Steve looks like when he’s tired, when he’s training, when he’s curled around a pillow on movie night with his knees tucked under himself, knows how Steve does a headcount every time he walks into a room, how everything in him seems to tense minutely when he can’t see everyone to keep them safe.

Now, it’s actually dangerous territory. Clint’s never been that good at getting himself out of dangerous territory. Normally, it has to almost kill him first.

“Yeah,” Steve says. “Okay.”

They take the subway. One person asks for Steve’s autograph, and a few people take pictures from a distance, but other than that, it’s pretty quiet. Clint fucking loves New York.

The door to his apartment swings open, and Clint sighs. Kate Bishop is sitting on his couch.

“Katie, whatever it is,” he pauses, “no. Actually, no. Just no.”

Kate scoffs, “Whatever, Hawkdude, you missed me.”

“How do you keep getting into my apartment?” Clint asks, dropping his bow case on the ground by the door. “You don’t have a key.”

“You don’t lock anything,” Kate points out. “Also, even if you did, I could pick said locks, because I’m cooler than you, old man, and oh my God. Oh my God. Clint, why am I looking at Captain America in your apartment right now?”

“Hawkeye,” says Steve, and Clint knows he’s talking to Kate.

“ _Clint_ ,” she hisses, and yeah, that’s him.

“Please stop talking,” says Clint. “I cannot handle another superhero related freak-out in my apartment, Katie. It’s just not happening.”

“Hey!” Kate says, “We don’t talk about the Deadpool thing.”

Clint is too tired to argue. “Like fight club.”

Kate nods, satisfied, “Like fight club.”

He points at her. “I’m gonna change. Because I’m gross and tired. And there’s a roof thing. Please do not scandalize Captain America while I’m gone.”

Kate salutes him, “I make no promises.” Then she grins, signs, _Are you gonna tell him about your—_

_  
_

He lunges forward, traps her hands between his own. “No. Stop signing. Stop that, he can understand that, don’t even— I’m leaving. Right now. Steve, don’t believe a word out of her mouth, she’s a filthy liar.”

Steve looks at him, almost smiling, and nods. “I think I can handle myself, Hawkeye.”

Kate grins. “That’s what they all say. Has Clint ever shown you the pictures from his time in the circus?” Clint flushes red and all but runs from the room to the sound of Kate saying, “Pink sequins, Cap. And _short shorts_.”

\--

“We have got to stop meeting like this.”

“It’s my roof,” says Clint. “And it’s happened twice.”

There’s a warm breeze, but it cuts through the stagnant heat nicely. Clint’s standing near the edge of the roof, a distance that might seem dangerous for anyone who isn’t a highly trained sniper, but to Clint it just feels soothing. He has seven different escape routes at this point. Only three of them might kill him.

“Rooftop at night. Me looking for you. You not telling any of us when something’s wrong. There are,” Steve lets out a breath, “similarities.”

“You got a thing for rooftops, Cap? Guys with too many issues?” And it should be light, should be funny, but the words come out harsh and quiet and so it isn’t. It isn’t funny. It just kind of hurts.

“What’s wrong, Clint? What happened back there?”

Clint laughs, low and hollow. “What happened? What happened is that I— I’m _human_ , Captain. I can’t be everywhere at once. I can’t keep you all safe. I can’t— I can’t, I just—”

“Hey,” and then Steve is close, tugging him into a hug and Clint doesn’t want to like it as much as he does, but he does. It feels safe. It feels like all the things he doesn’t let himself have. “It’s okay. No one’s hurt too badly. It’s fine, we’re fine, Hawkeye. You kept us safe.”

He pulls away, because it’s already gone on too long and he can feel Steve looking at him in that stupidly concerned way he does. He pulls away because that’s what he does. When things get too hard, or dangerous, or someone gets too close. “I _froze_.”

“It was a tricky situation.”

“I’ve been in trickier.”

“Anyone would have—”

“I’m not _anyone_ , and an Avenger shouldn’t have—”

“You don’t have to keep beating yourself up about this—”

“Yes, I do.” It comes out too sharply. The fight drains out of him, tension in his spine collapsing in on itself. “Yeah, yes, I really, really do, because today? Could have ended a lot worse than it did. Could have put one of us six feet under, Cap. And it would have been my fault. I’m supposed to keep you all safe, supposed to have your backs, and I froze today. And you can say that it’s normal, that it happens, and you’d be right. Fuck, you’re right, and I know that, but—”

He lets out a shaky breath, presses the heel of his hand into his eyes until he sees stars. “I can’t. I can’t mess up. I can’t _be_ anyone, Steve. I have to make that bullseye every goddamn time, or else—what good am I?”

Steve flinches, just a little, just enough that Clint is sure he isn’t supposed to mention it. “Clint—”

“No, no, it’s fine. It’s not like it’s something new. SHIELD is— SHIELD is what it is. As soon as I’m not useful, as soon as I fuck up too badly, I’m gone. Hell, after the Loki _bullshit_ , I’m surprised I’m still around at all. I don’t miss for a reason:” A pause. Another ragged breath. What the fuck, he’s already said as much, right? “I’m only worth the targets I hit, and I’m barely worth that.”

“That’s not,” says Steve, “You can’t honestly believe that.”

“Fuck you,” breathes Clint. “I don’t say things I don’t mean.”

Steve nods, once, slowly. “I wish I could make you see— hell, Barton. You’re not—you’re so much _more_ than that.”

“You have to say that,” Clint says. “I’m pretty sure it’s literally in your job description to say that.”

“I don’t say things I don’t mean,” says Steve, and Clint lets out a choked noise.

“Stop it,” he spits. It’s all he can think to say, isn’t sure he could even string together more than a few words at this point.

“You are worth more than that,” Steve says, and the worst part is that he honestly sounds like he believes it.

“Leave me alone, I can’t—I can’t deal with this right now, I need—” What does he need? A new job, probably. Less trauma in his childhood? Coffee? Hell, alcohol, probably. “Just leave.”

Steve looks at him for a long time. “You’re important, Clint Barton. It doesn’t matter if you never hit the target ever again, you’re still a good person, I would still trust you with my life.”

Clint’s head is swimming. His heart feels like it’s pounding in his wrists, eyes squeezed shut again. “Get the fuck off my roof,” he hisses.

He feels more than hears as Steve stops, hesitates, and then goes.

Kate finds him there, a few hours later, and-- God bless her-- she brings him coffee.

“Rough night?” she asks.

He doesn’t answer, just takes the coffee and stares at his feet. His eyes feel itchy and dry and he’s almost one hundred percent sure ‘rough night’ doesn’t even begin to cover it. He tells Kate as much.

“Oh, Clint,” Kate says. She sits next to him, backs against the edge of the roof, and drops her head onto his shoulder. His tucks his free arm neatly around her waist. “Dummy,” she says.

Clint hums his agreement. “How ‘m I gonna fix this one, Katie?”

“My normal answer would be: kiss and make up, but somehow I think that might actually get you in more trouble?”

“Probably,” he shrugs.

“You, Clint Barton, are very good at digging yourself into, like, giant fucking holes.”

He winces. “Yeah.”

“But,” says Kate, with a smile that’s either supposed to be comforting or terrifying, and he’s leaning towards the latter, “you’re also very good at getting yourself out of them.”

\--

Here’s the thing: Clint Barton’s hands don’t shake. They don’t. It’s part of being a fucking sniper, okay? His hands don’t shake. They’re the steadiest part of him. On a bad day, they’re the only steady part of him.

Right now? His hands are shaking. Just a faint tremor in his fingers, but it’s there and it kind of really fucking sucks.

“Are you okay?”

“Nat. Great. You’re exactly who I wanted to see right now. This is fine. This is perfect, actually.”

Natasha raises an eyebrow. “You’re not okay.”

“I’m not okay,” says Clint, because when it comes to Natasha, she’s usually right and it’s a hell of a lot easier to just agree with her the first time around.

“You gonna tell me why, or am I going to have to get you drunk first?”

Clint giggles, honest to God _giggles_ , and Natasha’s eyebrow gets a little bit higher. “Well, actually, I’m kind of trying to tell the good Captain something very important and I’d really like to be sober for it.” He shrugs, clenches his hands into fists even though it doesn’t really help. “After his horribly polite and understanding rejection, though, I’d really appreciate you asking me that again.”

“Oh dear,” says Natasha. She grins, “Stark’s gonna be so mad, Bruce is going to win the bet.”

“Neither of those things are surprising to anybody,” says Clint. Then, “wait, what bet?”

Natasha just looks at him like she’s a little disappointed. She says “I’ll see you tomorrow,” and starts walking back the way she’d come from.

“No,” says Clint, to an empty hallway, “seriously. What bet?”

“Clint,” says Steve. Then, “Who are you talking to?”

“Well, I _was_ —y’know what? Never mind.”

Steve opens the door a little wider. “Okay,” he says, “Would you like to come in?”

“Not really,” says Clint, shoving his hands into his pockets, “but I kinda feel like it would be weird if I didn’t? So yeah, if you don’t mind, I’ll—um. You should probably sit down?”

Steve doesn't sit down. Clint has been in Steve’s room at the tower before, and it’s not much. It’s pretty bare, actually, but Clint has lived in SHIELD barracks before, and so he gets it. Still, there’s a sketchbook on the nightstand and Cap’s shield is resting against the wall and it’s lived in, even if it’s sparse. Plus, because Tony Stark bought most of it, Clint’s pretty sure one of Steve’s pillowcases costs more than, like, his entire bed. Blankets and all.

He sits on the desk chair, because his only other option is the bed and, yeah, wow, that’s so not happening.

“I feel like I should start with an apology,” says Clint, “but Fury gets mad when I say sorry for things I’m not sorry for.”

“I don’t need an apology,” says Steve, “and Fury should know better than to make you apologize to the junior agents, anyway.”

“Yeah, those are usually half-assed. And I mean, it’s not like I don’t want to apologize, to you, that is, because I’ve kind of been a dick lately, but I’m not really sorry for—okay, y’know what? Starting over. I’m gonna start over.”

“Clint,” Steve says. There’s something warm in his eyes and the light is hitting him really nicely and Clint can’t look away for a moment. “Breathe.”

Clint inhales. “Right.”

“If you don’t want to apologize, what’d you come here to say?”

Clint winces. “I don’t really, I mean—I’m not sure where to start.”

“The beginning’s usually good,” and that’s definitely amusement coming from Steve now, definitely something warm and fond and Clint’s eyes narrow.

“Oh my God,” he says, “you _know_. You bastard, you totally know, and you were ready to let me sit here and make a fool of myself, weren’t you?”

Steve, at least, has the decency to look shamed, flush rising in his cheeks as his hand rubs at the back of his neck. “I, uh. I wanted to hear you,” he admits, “say it.”

Something in Clint goes cold, at that. The pieces feel like they’re falling into place, and not in a good way. “What,” he mumbles, “so you could feel even better about turning me down?”

“What?” asks Steve, and he honestly looks confused. “What do you mean turn you down, I—” He blinks, slowly. “Clint, I’m not gonna turn you down.”

That stops everything. Like, Clint is pretty sure time stops, only time doesn’t stop, so that means he spends at least thirty seconds frozen still and looking at Steve like he’s suddenly caught on fire and grown a second head at the same time. Well, at least his hands have stopped shaking.

“Clint?”

“What was that? That thing you just said, I think I—I dunno, my hearing aids must be acting up, or—”

“Clint.” And then Steve has one hand on Clint’s shoulder and the other is tilting his chin up so he can make eye contact and Clint knows he’s blushing, knows he probably looks like a goddamn idiot, but he smiles anyway.

“You said—”

“I said,” Steve smiles. “I’m not turning you down.”

“So you,” Clint swallows, “You would—you and I, I mean—”

“Yes. God, Clint, yeah. Yes.”

“Oh,” says Clint. “Okay. Cool. That’s—that’s cool.”

“Are you okay?” asks Steve.

“I don’t really know, I’ll get back to you.” His own hand comes up and pulls Steve’s away from his chin, rests their palms together from the wrist to the tips of their fingers, and the weirdest part about it is how Steve doesn’t pull away. “Oh, okay, wow.”

“Clint,” Steve says, and he’s smiling, warm and easy and Clint has never had this feeling in his chest, this feeling like everything is buoyant and electric and good.

“Sh,” he says, “Quiet, I’m thinking.”

Steve mouths sorry, then immediately contradicts that by saying, quietly, “What are you thinking about?”

“‘M thinking that Kate and Bobbi and Natasha and hell, Coulson, probably, were all right: I really, _really_ suck at communicating.”

There’s a laugh, and Steve says, “Yeah. That makes two of us.”

“Hey,” says Clint, “At least you tried. I told you to get the fuck off my roof.”

Steve tugs Clint up, out of the chair, and kisses him. No hesitation, nothing, just kisses him like it’s the only thing he wants to be doing and Clint kisses back. It’s soft, mouths just barely open, cautious and curious and warm and Clint is definitely sure this is the only thing he wants to be doing. Probably forever. The kissing doesn’t get much deeper, not because of any lack of wanting, because Clint doesn’t know about Steve, but he definitely wants.

More because this thing between them is still new and fragile and Clint kind of really wants to see where it goes. Some part of him (probably the more sensible part) is telling him to turn tail and run as fast as he can in the opposite direction. The other, bigger part of him is saying that the afternoon sunlight coming in through the window is hitting Steve’s face in all of the right places and telling him that he feels safe. He feels _safe_ , and it’s terrifying in the best possible way.

Their hands are still pressed together, fingers tangled, and Clint matches Steve’s hand on his shoulder by pressing one to his cheek. His thumb brushes over Steve’s cheekbone and he shudders. Eventually, they pull back, and Steve rests his forehead against Clint’s, a reassuring weight.

“Hey,” Clint says.

“Hey,” says Steve.

“Holy shit,” mumbles Clint and Steve laughs and Clint has to kiss him again, he has to, he can’t not kiss the stupid smile off of Steve’s face now that he’s allowed to. He’s allowed to. He’s allowed this. He can be happy, he can let go, it’s okay.

“Is this okay?” he asks.

Steve pulls him just a little bit closer and says, “ _yes_ ,” against his mouth, and it’s the smallest thing, that word, but Clint believes him.

\--

“Talk to me, Hawkeye.”

“There’s another one of those weird blob things up the block from you, y’know that ones that you have to literally set on fire to kill? Gross. Thor’s in the air, somewhere, Hulk has Iron Man because a fucking building landed on him, of all things—”

“I’m fine, Jesus, and it was only part of a building—”

“Dodge better,” Clint snaps, “and I’m not really sure where Widow is—”

“I’m currently setting fire to the blob.”

“Oh, okay,” says Clint, “Black Widow is setting fire to the blob thing.”

Steve laughs, “Anything else to report while you’re at it?”

He’s baiting, Clint knows he’s baiting, but he also knows that it is so fun, so much fun when Steve plays into their banter during fights instead of stressing out over not knowing what’s going on and where everyone is.

Tony says “no,” and Natasha says “dear God, not this—” and Clint says, “Your ass looks amazing, as always, Captain. But you knew that.”

“Why don’t I have a sexy archer to feed my ego?” asks Tony. “I want a refund.”

“I’m telling Pepper,” Natasha says.

Over Tony’s begging, Clint hears: “Widow got the last of them. Soon as Iron Man’s free, we can head back home. Hawkeye, you up for dinner tonight? That little Italian place near your apartment?”

**  
** “Captain,” Clint says, grinning, “it would be my genuine pleasure.”

**Author's Note:**

> i'm on tumblr @phaethos and twitter @sunwillcatch


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